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Thursday, 11 August 2016

Putin, Erdogan Ready to Patch up Differences over Syria

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, are holding a joint news conference in St. Petersburg following their meeting. Items for discussion on the agenda were expected to include economic projects and the settlement of the Syrian crisis. Erdogan is on his first foreign visit since the attempted military coup in Turkey.

MOSCOW-Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan presented a united front at their first meeting since Turkey shot down a Russian plane last year, promising to rapidly rebuild a damaged economic relationship and find a new common policy for solving the crisis in Syria, RT reported.

“We have gone through a very difficult moment in the relationship between our two countries, but now we would all like to overcome it in the interests of both our peoples,” said the Russian president during a joint press conference with his Turkish counterpart in St. Petersburg on Tuesday .

“We want to restore our relationship not only for pragmatic reasons, but in the long-term interests of our countries, and for the sake of promoting good neighborly relations between Russians and Turks.”

As Erdogan wrapped up his one-day visit, the two presidents were effusive in their praise for each other, promising to lift the sanctions imposed after Turkey shot down a Russian plane over Syria in November last year, and to reanimate joint energy projects.

Putin did not attempt to gloss over the disagreements over the crisis in Syria. But the two sides agreed to stage a separate meeting to hammer out a new Syria policy.

“Our views on resolving the Syrian situation have often been at odds,” said Putin. “But I believe that finding a common approach is possible, at least because we both want the crisis to end. We will use this as the basis for finding common solutions.”

Outside observers noted that the abortive putsch marked a rapid turning point in the relations between the two countries, though signs of a rapprochement had been evident the month before, when Erdogan apologized for the downing of the plane.

Earlier in the day, Putin and Erdogan held a meeting in the Russian city of St. Petersburg.

The two presidents met for the first time since Turkey’s downing of a Russian warplane in November 2015, Sputnik reported.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said his Turkish counterpart’s visit following the November 2015 downing of a Russian aircraft by Turkey speaks to efforts to renew dialogue.

“Your visit today, despite the very difficult political situation in Turkey, says that we all want to resume our dialogue, rapprochement in the interests of the peoples of Turkey and Russia,” Putin said at the start of talks.

Ankara and Moscow ended seven months of strained relations in late June when Erdogan wrote a letter to Putin in which he apologized for the incident in November.

Putin said despite “very low, degraded” relations between the countries after the Su-24 downing, ties between Russia and Turkey have reached “unprecedented levels” in recent years.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would discuss the full range of bilateral issues with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan during their Tuesday meeting.

“We will have the opportunity today to discuss the full range of our relations, including the restoration of economic ties, anti-terrorism cooperation,” Putin said.

Turkey is building a “strong mechanism” with Russia to try to find a solution in Syria and a delegation including foreign ministry, military and intelligence officials will go to Russia Wednesday for talks, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.

In an interview with the state-run Anadolu agency, Cavusoglu also said that President Vladimir Putin had said Russia would lift embargos on Turkish products and that, if needed, additional agreements would be signed to ensure work goes ahead on the TurkStream gas pipeline project.

Putin and Erdogan took a big step towards normalizing ties Tuesday, with their leaders announcing an acceleration in trade and energy links. Their meeting in St Petersburg came almost nine months after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane near the Syrian border, prompting Russian sanctions.